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Today:
AI built a trillion-dollar hype machine, then ran into a metal most people can't pronounce.
Coffee at the ready…
The Big Sip
A block with the symbol, atomic number and mass number of Ruthenium (Ru) element.
Ruthenium AI demand pushed the metal to an all-time high of $1,750 an ounce.
Data centres need it for hard drives and chips — and AI workloads are eating storage capacity alive.
The problem:
Global supply is roughly 30 tonnes a year. All of it scraped out as a byproduct of platinum mining (mostly in South Africa).
Metals Focus expects a 203,000-ounce deficit in 2026.
Tech giants can raise billions in a week. They can't conjure a byproduct metal out of the ground any faster.
Sponsor Break
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Here’s Your Brew
Twelve months ago, ruthenium traded at $560 an ounce. By March 13, it hit $1,750 — smashing its previous record of $870, set in 2007.
Gold, platinum, and palladium barely moved over the same period. Ruthenium blew past all of them by triple digits.
This isn't a blip (the supply problem is baked in).
South Africa produces around 90% of the world's ruthenium. You can't mine it directly — it only appears when you refine platinum ore.
So ruthenium output depends on platinum economics, not ruthenium demand. Nicky Shiels at MKS PAMP calls it a "precious proxy for the AI buildout."
Investors have noticed.
South Africa's PGM output fell about 5% in the first ten months of 2025.
Floods and plant shutdowns did the damage. Output should tick up in 2026, but Bank of America says it won't close the gap. Meanwhile, the Hormuz crisis is pushing energy costs higher for South African miners already short on electricity.
More squeeze, less supply.
There's no exchange for ruthenium. No futures market. No centralised price discovery.
Traders report scrambling for any stock they can find. Your trillion-dollar AI buildout depends on 30 tonnes of a metal with no futures market. From ONE country.
That's not a supply chain. That's a prayer.
Two Sides, One Mug
Curse and Coffee
Pro: Higher prices could push platinum miners to expand — and make recycling worth it. Recovery from e-waste already hits 95% efficiency.
Con: New platinum mines take 10–14 years to build, and ruthenium recycling barely exists at scale.
Our read: This deficit won't close this decade, not without substantial funding for both mining and recycling.
Receipt of the Day
[Report] Reuters via Yahoo Finance — "Ruthenium prices hit record high as AI boom squeezes supply"
Metals Focus expects a 203,000-ounce deficit in 2026. AI data storage demand is growing faster than South African mines can supply.
Why it matters: AI's physical buildout now depends on metals most investors couldn't name.
Spit Take
212% — Ruthenium's price rise in 12 months. (LSEG/Johnson Matthey)
Your Coffee Break Links (and water cooler chatter)
Al Jazeera — Oil tops $106 as Hormuz stays shut — Brent crude up 40% since the war started. Trump wants a naval coalition; nobody's volunteering.
UPI — Cuba hits day 10 of protests — Rolling blackouts, no fuel, 61% of the grid dark. Havana's banging pots. The Communist Party HQ in Morón is ashes.
Miningmx — South Africa's PGM producers post record profits — Northam Platinum's operating profit up 439%. Timing is everything when your byproducts suddenly power the AI boom.
Mugshot Poll 📊
What's the real bottleneck for AI?
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